Kirk Douglas on his movie with the “perfect screenplay”
After an early period on the stage, Kirk Douglas set about becoming a true icon of Hollywood and American cinema. A film debut arrived in the 1946 film The Strange Love of Martha Ivers, a handful of years before a breakthrough role in Mark Robson’s Champion saw Douglas establish himself in the tough guy archetype.
With an Academy Award nomination under his belt, Douglas had his sights set on stardom and he proceeded to give some of the most memorable acting performances of the 20th century, including those in The Bad and the Beautiful, Lust for Life, Spartacus and Seven Days in May.
With so many brilliant movie performances to his name, Douglas must have had one hell of a job sorting through them and thinking about the ones that he holds closet to his heart. However, in a feature with HuffPost, the legendary director one stated his top choice and within those, he picked out his favourite movie of all time.
The 1962 black and white western movie Lonely are the Brave was directed by David Miller and written by Dalton Trumbo as an adaptation of Edward Abbey’s 1956 novel The Brave Cowboy. Also starring Gena Rowlands and Walter Matthau, the film saw Douglas play a cowboy, Rowlands his best friend’s wife and Matthau a sheriff who chases Douglas’ character down.
“As I have said, this is my favourite movie,” Douglas said of Lonely Are the Brave. “Dalton wrote a perfect screenplay – one draft, no revisions. I love the theme that if you try to be an individual, society will crush you. I play a modern-day cowboy still living by the code of the Old West.” Indeed, as Douglas notes, his character, Jack Burns, is a man who rejects modern society, refusing to carry a driver’s license or even have a place of permanent residence.
Discussing the gruelling moments of the film’s production, Douglas said, “My character gets into a bar fight with a vicious one-armed man. He was actually Burt Lancaster’s stand-in, who had lost his arm in the war. It was a tough shoot in and around Albuquerque – high altitude, snow, fog and freezing rain in May!”
If the film’s physical challenges were gruelling, then Douglas’ working relationship with director David Miller made things worse. “I didn’t get along with [him] very well; plus, he had no regard for safety,” the actor said. At one point, Douglas was required to shoot a scene on a “narrow ledge with a steep drop”, and Miller asked him to walk his horse around on its outside.
Douglas instead wanted to stay on the inside of the ledge so the horse could protect itself. However, after explaining his idea to Miller, the director continued to argue with Douglas, but having “seen too many unnecessary accidents to agree,” Douglas stuck to his own ideas and performed the scene as he wished. After all, he noted, “The best relationship I had on this film was with my horse, Whisky. Of course, the horse couldn’t talk back.”
Still, despite the cold shoot and the issues with the director, Douglas found that his experience on Lonely Are the Brave and its final product ended up being his favourite movie. Alongside Ace in the Hole, Lust for Life and Spartacus, Miller’s film might go under the radar somewhat, but it reveals the film that Douglas held closest to his heart.
